Friday, September 28, 2007

So three days after "Halo Day" has it changed the world of video games as we know it? No, but that's not to say it isn't special all the same.

In case you missed it - and I have to say, even if you are not a gamer I don't know how you could not have been exposed to at least some of the hype on this game, it even made the BBC evening news (albeit with footage of a different game) - Halo 3, the final (yeah right) game in the Halo series was launched.

I wasn't going to get it as I am not that big a Halo fan. I enjoyed the single player campaign of both its predecessors - it is actually one of my favourite FPS now I come to think of it - but the Xbox Live experience has never really made me want to go online and play. Mind you the same could be said about any FPS. However since I have found a whole load of easy going 30 something UK gamers to play online with I thought I could give it a go. That and the fact that when I looked to see who was playing what on Wednesday every single person on my friends list was playing Halo 3, even my brother in law who is not a FPS fan at all.

The campaign is so far pretty damn good. The game looks amazing, the enemy grunts are as stupidly funny as ever and the enemy AI (something I loved about the first one) is great with them taking cover and generally making your task difficult. The big set pieces are great - taking down the Scarab tanks for instance - and the difficulty is just right (for me anyway).

Online with friends however is a total blast. I have not had so much fun playing an online multi player game ever. Blasting around a level on the back of a warthog shooting everything that moves while your team mate driver laughs as he runs over the opposition is amazing. Team shooters are nearly always fun, but the vehicles in Halo 3 make it near gaming nirvana.

Then you add in the fantastic website at bungie.net with the game stats tracking and ability to download, share and replay an entire match from any angle!! Let me say that again. Any game played can be saved off to an online share where others can download it to their console and replay it from any angle or point of view of any player. That's pretty impressive. For the "pro" clans out there it will make practice and analysis of games pretty easy to do in an organised manner. For the rest of us its a cool feature to send clips of especially sweet kills to those who you fragged.

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Here it is! It is truly magnificent. Pictures don't do it justice it has to be sat at to be truly appreciated. Jola is a bit, er, overawed by its size but I am sure she will get over that. Roll on Saturday.

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

It seems like every last one of my friends is busy increasing the population of the world right now putting peer group pressure like nothing else on those of us with spouse but no offspring. Today I found this and it reminded me why its probably not a great idea for me to have a kid right now.

Friday, September 14, 2007

Baldness, it’s an unfortunate fact of life for most blokes with almost a third appreciably bald by the age of 30 and nearly all suffering from a degree of hair loss by the time they reach 60. There are currently over ten million baldies in the UK.

But with celebrity slapheads such as Andre Agassi, Billy Zane, Bruce Willis and Philip Green demonstrating that you can have a glittering career and have no problem attracting the ladies there’s never been a better time to go bare. And of-course, let’s not forget those men who choose to keep it trim – including Thierry Henry, Phil Vickery and Freddie Lundberg.

Most products aimed at bald men try to disguise the issue or encourge re-growth but new Stateside phenomenom Bald Guyz encourages men to boldly go bald. It’s a collection of “head” care products specifically designed for the follicaly challenged or those keeping their hair to a minimum. US star smoothies such as Kevin Youkilis, Boston Red Sox First Baseman and Chirs Shearn, YES-TV Network Sportscaster and from September it’s available in larger Boots stores nationwide.

Saturday, September 08, 2007

Its my birthday on 23rd September and I would like to treat myself to this rather nice poker table upon which to enjoy my birthday home game.Trouble is that its a little bit pricey - £250 - and I really can't justify the money right now. So... in the spirit of "if you don't ask you don't get" I am asking for birthday donations towards the price. If I can get together enough donations to cover half the cost then I will treat myself, if not then I will find something else to treat myself to and send out lots of thank you letters to everyone who doesn't think that this is an absolute liberty.

Tuesday, September 04, 2007

The intertubes are always there to make me feel centered, sane and well adjusted. Having through no fault of my own just been exposed to the particular fetish of some-random-internet-person I am left feeling so very very vanilla in my tastes.

Somebody has put a lot of time and effort into this picture, the scales on the brown dragon alone must have taken ages. It does leave me wondering just how one develops a fascination with the idea of dragons that fuck cars and to the extent that they are motivated to produce an entire series of pictures on the subject! I really must try harder at being a pervert.

Saturday, September 01, 2007

In Walthamstow for the £30 rebuy at the Equal Chance club. This is the craziest game of the month there and this time it was even worse due to a TV crew making a documentary on the club. This led to a "feature" table of the loosest fishiest players in the club doing their plums for the cameras. Hardly a compelling argument for the luck vs. skill debate.

I got out of the game early when I realised I was never going to get a stack and remain within my budget without some serious divine intervention. Instead I waited for Rod and killed time playing pot limit Omaha split eights or better online. Now Omaha hi/lo is perhaps one of the sickest poker games around, a true game of odds and calculations and thus home to some degenerate gamblers but nothing compared to what I was about to witness.

A large gentleman of middle eastern origin had one of the club staff deposit £1000 into his account via credit card for him and set up the terminal for him to play on. High stakes game? I wondered. Nope he was going to play an online fruit machine.

For the next half hour he roboticaly clicked away the full £1000, £2 a click even the "winnings". Most of the time he wasn't even looking at the screen as he was in conversation with a friend. The barman brought them both cokes and a heated discussion ensued as the fact that alcohol had once been served in the glasses was an issue for them both. I couldn't help but ponder the odd hypocrisy of a religious belief that meant they would argue over how well a glass had been cleansed of alcohol while mindlessly gambling what must be a months wages for someone.